Maro Gorky was born in New York, the eldest daughter of the American Abstract Expresssionist painter Archille Gorky. Her first memories of painting are with him as a child. She has lived in Tuscany with her husband, the writer and artist, Mathew Spender since the late 1960’s. Bernardo Bertolucci’s 1996 film, Stealing Beauty celebrated this extraordinary marriage. Her painting in recent years has been concerned with the Tuscan landscape which surrounds her. In her work nature evolves into crystalline forms and shapes of intense colour. The Mulberry tree by her window, the five hills and pine trees which she sees daily have become increasingly abstract in her painting. ‘Gorky’s stained-glass colour, crisp shapes and compositional majesty instil her syntheses of previous art with the force of an individual intently focused personality. You can’t ask much more of art.’ –Roberta Smith, New York Times, 2006.
